System for anonymous cohort-matched content delivery

Abstract

A system and method are provided to enable commercial and personal data use cases by implementing comparison methods that are applied to an entirely anonymous version of the underlying user data. The system architecture allows for anonymization of input user identifying data to uniquely protect that data while making attribute information regarding groups of users available for other entities to access in a manner that allows the other entities to target groups of users according to the attribute information. A unique level of compartmentalization of anonymous and non-anonymous data including temporal and geographic anonymization barriers is provided. The processes enable the system to continually learn and improve its ability to perform cohort discovery, cohort-matching and cohort-matched content delivery in an entirely anonymous data space are also specified. Lastly, the architecture, processes and user incentives provide necessary components to render the closed loop system continually updateable with user's longitudinal data.

We claim: 
     
         1 . A system for sharing user data, comprising:
 a data storage device for storing user data; and   a server that is configured to
 establish communications with the data storage device and with a plurality of user devices; 
 accept first user data from a plurality of first users, the first user data being input by the first users' user devices and communicated to the server; 
 segregate first user private data from the accepted first user data for each first user; 
 securely store the first user private data in the data storage device; 
 anonymize attributes of the first user data to provide anonymized first user data; 
 separately store the anonymized first user data in the data storage device; 
 receive a request for information from a second user on a first user population according to specified attributes, wherein the request is communicated to the server via the second user's user device; 
 compile a response to the request for information on the first user population according to the specified attributes; and 
 output the compiled response to the second user's user device in reply to the request. 
   
     
     
         2 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the server anonymizes the attributes of the first user data to provide the anonymized first user data according to a prescribed anonymization scheme that completely masks access to the first user private data. 
     
     
         3 . The system of  claim 2 , wherein the server is further configured to apply a separate encryption scheme to at least a portion of the first user private data. 
     
     
         4 . The system of  claim 2 , wherein the server is further configured to apply a separate obfuscation scheme to at least a portion of the first user private data. 
     
     
         5 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the anonymized first user data is sortable according to the attributes. 
     
     
         6 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein identification of first user private data is selectable by each first user. 
     
     
         7 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein identification of first user private data is according to a prescribed scheme. 
     
     
         8 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the attributes are selectable by each first user. 
     
     
         9 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the server is further configured to group the anonymized data for the plurality of first users according to the attributes. 
     
     
         10 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein at least one of the attributes has a range of numeric values associated with the at least one of the attributes. 
     
     
         11 . The system of  claim 10 , wherein the server is further configured to group the anonymized data according to discrete sub-ranges for the range of numeric values associated with the at least one of the attributes. 
     
     
         12 . The system of  claim 10 , wherein the server is further configured to group the anonymized data according to percentiles of the first user population falling within the sub-ranges for the range of numeric values associated with the at least one of the attributes. 
     
     
         13 . The system of  claim 10 , wherein the server is further configured to access publicly available data to bound the range of numeric values associated with the at least one of the attributes. 
     
     
         14 . A method for sharing user data, comprising:
 establishing communications between a server and a data storage device;   establishing communications between a server and a plurality of user devices;   accepting, with the server, first user data from a plurality of first users, the first user data being input by the first users' user devices and communicated to the server;   segregating, with the server, first user private data from the accepted first user data for each first user;   securely storing, with the server, the first user private data in the data storage device;   anonymizing attributes of the first user data, with the server, to provide anonymized first user data;   separately storing, with the server, the anonymized first user data in the data storage device;   receiving, with the server, a request for information from a second user on a first user population according to specified attributes, wherein the request is communicated to the server via the second user's user device;   compiling, with the server, a response to the request for information on the first user population according to the specified attributes; and   outputting from the server the compiled response via communication with the second user's user device in reply to the request.   
     
     
         15 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the server anonymizes the attributes of the first user data to provide the anonymized first user data according to a prescribed anonymization scheme that completely masks access to the first user private data. 
     
     
         16 . The method of  claim 15 , wherein the server is further configured to apply a separate encryption scheme to at least a portion of the first user private data. 
     
     
         17 . The method of  claim 15 , wherein the server is further configured to apply a separate obfuscation scheme to at least a portion of the first user private data. 
     
     
         18 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the anonymized first user data is sortable according to the attributes. 
     
     
         19 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein identification of first user private data is selectable by each first user. 
     
     
         20 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein identification of first user private data is according to a prescribed scheme.